Dead Body Road #4

By Justin Jordan, Matteo Scalera & Moreno Dinisio

Dead Body Road has been a gritty revenge story about a man with a dark past out to punish the criminals who killed his security guard wife during a bank robbery. These days, comics have grown beyond the superhero stereotype they once were pigeonholed with, which is why a lot of people find it easy to compare them to things like television shows or movies. This latest issue of Dead Body Road is a prime example of how many comics do garner that kind of comparison, since this entire issue was one action-packed and brutal car chase scene.

Dead Body Road is a series that once you get settled in after the first issue it flows incredibly well from issue to issue without the reader feeling lost or forgetting parts of the story. Because of this, every issue of Dead Body Road has been a smooth read from month-to-month. It wasn’t even till the end of this issue that I realized that the whole issue was basically one long car chase scene. Justin Jordan has been doing an excellent job with the pacing of this series to the point that you can just jump in and enjoy it without feeling bogged down with an overcomplicated story. This car chase still has plenty of story advancement and a few reveals that add to the story on top of all the gunshots and screeching tires. This was an outstanding issue of Dead Body Road, when it comes to car chases in comics it’s extremely hard to pull it off but Dead Body Road pulls it off while still delivering a great read.

A big part of pulling of a comic book car chase is being able to have the artist reflect the action onto the page. The whole essence of a car chase is one of fast moving chaos, which is something that’s hard to pinpoint and place into still panels on a page. However this is why Matteo Scalera is one of the biggest names in comic art right now, because he is able to execute this while actually making it seem easy. Using horizontal two page spreads to showcase all of the action in this vehicular pursuit, worked incredibly well when it came to both delivering the story and reflecting the chaotic chase. There are so many different things that happen in this issue that a lesser artist might not have been able to deliver such a cohesive chapter in this story. Scalera is an incredible artist but it’s issues like this that truly show what he’s capable of doing as far as using his art to help enhance a story.

Another month has come and gone, and with that we get another splendid issue of Dead Body Road. This series has gone above and beyond what expectations people may have placed on it before and successfully has become a crime comic classic. Anyone who loves a good modern day crime story should really be giving this comic some attention. Dead Body Road is easily one of those series that you get excited about reading every month.